Nick Bourne AM

Llanwrtyd Wells better known for its man versus horse contest and Bog Snorkelling competition is now harnessing the web to help deliver healthcare in the twenty first century.
Builth and Llanwrtyd Medical Practice is using YouTube to give advice to patients on subjects like smear testing, flu vaccines, and how to use an inhaler. The advice is imparted by Sister Pat Jones and is the brainchild of Dr. Richard Williams.

Well done to them both and all concerned.

I am sure that  I am not alone in being stunned at the suggestion of the Derbyshire police chief that he could not release pictures of two absconding murderers seemingly because of fear that to do so might breach their human rights.. It is hard to see how such an argument could possibly hold water unless the human right in issue is a right to remain at large after escaping from lawful custody.

 
 Now if there is doubt about the scope of the human rights legslation and it has to be said it has proved to be somethinmg of a Pandora’s box then the legislation needs reviewing as a matter of urgency. However, even given doubt as to its precise scope the idiocy of a police force invested with the duty of protection of the public failing to provide such vital information to the very members of the public it is supposed to be protecting is bound to undermine public confidence in the excellence of the police service.

 
I am relieved to see that the Lord Chancellor, Lord Falconer,  speedily dismissed the Derbyshire Constabary position as nonsense but there is clearly a need to re-balance the human rights legislation in favour of  the public at large and to clarify its scope as a matter of some urgency though I am certain that the Welsh poice forces wouold not behave in this inane and crass way.

One very good thing about Christmas and the New Year is renewing acquaintance with old friends both overseas and nearer at home.
Traditionally I hear from my three godchildren at this time of year - twins William and James and Kate whose birthday is Burns night  mental note don’t forget!

 
I also hear from old college friends- Hywel who had the room next to me in college married to Emily from Florida where they live. He is still thoroughly Welsh though now sounmds more .Miami than Cardiff. Richard Foote an old Trinity friend and now Profesor of Mathematics at Vermont- he got his fellowship at Cambridge on the basis of discovering a new number which I never really understood also writes as do a host of friends from Malaysia and Singapore. Others working in Washington — Democrats but working for the
administration. I didn’t think that happened in the States? Perhaps they are that breed DINO- Democrat in name only!
Closer at hand I  hear from Alison Halford a real star. She is as busy as ever writing trvelling and exercising her dogs. It is good to speak with her.

 
Occasionally one catches up with old friends but not often enough,sadly.

Early in the New Year is an appropriate time to look back on what has been a truly remarkable year in British politics.  Just over a year ago David Cameron had a massive victory in the leadership election for the Conservative Party.  After ten years of political doldrums the Conservative Party has been renewed.  To many of us it seemed that the Party was in desperate straits but cometh the hour cometh the man, and things now look very different.
 

David Cameron received a mandate for change.  He has set about introducing an ‘A’ list candidate approach to ensure that more women and more people from ethnic minorities are adopted as candidates and this has certainly already paid dividends across the United Kingdom. 
 

The Conservative Party has also been seizing the initiative in a way that has not happened for some time.  Concern for the environment and sustainability, concern on global poverty, commitment to localism and our devolved institutions and nations, and the importance of excellence in public services have all been put in the vanguard of our approach as a Party.  Quite right too. 
 

Recently the statement of David Davis on human trafficking, and David Cameron’s statements on food patriotism (which tie in very neatly with what Brynle Williams has said for us in the last month or so) ensure that we are coming up with the right approach to issues and reflecting what people in Britain want. 
 

The Party is united.  The front bench is a strong team and with the ‘big hitters’ of William Hague (Foreign Affairs), David Davis (Home Affairs) and George Osborne (Treasury), together with Oliver Letwin’s policy role, there is a very obvious government in waiting – not a long wait I hope and trust.  Cheryl Gillan has been magnificent too.
 

Meanwhile the Liberal Democrats seem to have lost their way with a Leader who, whilst  respected in Foreign Affairs, is not, I think, the man to lead them at the beginning of the 21^st Century.  He seems out of step with the times.  The Labour Party is clearly about to drop its pilot, and is in a state of some paralysis with infighting barely concealed within its ranks.
 

As we enter 2007 it is the Conservative Party that is making the political weather and that is a welcome change from the last decade, and I think shows that politics has become competitive again, which is in everybody’s interest.

The death at 93 of Gerald Ford brings to an end the remarkable life of the oldest American President.  His death is significant as it marks the passing of a man who was clearly thoroughly decent and who pulled America through the dreadful aftermath of the Watergate crisis and the resignation in ignominy of Richard Nixon.  I think it is hard now to appreciate just how deep a mood of pessimism and national gloom hovered over the United States in those years.  I remember staying in Washington with a family of a college friend.  The family was on close personal terms with Gerald Ford, indeed Marcia, the friend was a close friend of Gerald Ford’s daughter.  I realised from their talk the immense strain that he had been under.  He had certainly not sought the Presidency and it has been often stated now ‘he was the only American President never to have been elected as Vice President or President and thus came to the office totally unexpectedly’. A thoroughly decent man pulled the United States through a very difficult period and the national optimism which characterises America was soon restored.
 

Gerald Ford, of course, was not the only accidental President.  There were others who ascended to the top slot through circumstance having been previously the Vice President. Calvin Coolidge is an interesting study in this regard.  In fact he was not really expected to become Vice President and had been only nominated at the last minute by a delegate from Oregon to thwart a group of powerful Senators who had been responsible for the choice of Warren Harding as President and were confident that they could get Irvine Lenroot of Wisconsin selected as Vice Presidential running mate.  It was the Governor of Massachusetts who had been the hero of the recent Boston Police strike who emerged with victory on the first ballot, however.  .
 

Coolidge was the most taciturn of politicians.  He was a man of famously few words.  It was said that a woman sitting next to him at a dinner had said that she had a bet with her friends at home that she could get more than two words out of the President over dinner.  Coolidge is reputed to have said to her “you lose” and said nothing more to her for the whole of the meal. 
 

He was the only President ever to be born on Independence Day and when he became Vice President his friends said that Warren Harding would not last.  Apparently it was not a good idea to be a President of any association of which Coolidge was Vice President.  He was notoriously lucky.  As a politician he had this in common, though little else, with Margaret Thatcher. 
 

In any event, Harding died and Coolidge was awakened at his father’s farm in Vermont, where he had been helping out.  In the middle of night he took the Oath of Office   He took the Oath of Office from his father who was a Justice of the Peace.  He was sworn in by candlelight and went back to bed.  It is hard to imagine that now in the context of the US Presidency.   In a similar way to Gerald Ford, Coolidge, again a thoroughly decent, honourable man, restored the reputation of the Presidency that had been badly tarnished by Warren Harding.
 

It was the silent and unassuming Vermont man who emerged as victor in his own right in the 1924 Presidential election by a massive margin.  He scored a remarkable victory winning all the major states in the East and all in the West except for Wisconsin.  He did not run in 1928, which he could have done, and was successful in domestic politics, though in the realm of foreign policy perhaps lacked some of the imagination and flair that was necessary at the time.

We have just launched an important policy regarding the funding of hospices in Wales and hospice treatment for Welsh patients. I passionately believe that hospices need this core funding. The hospices in Wales and more importantly the staff providing the excellent care deserve our full support in what they do. Whilst there is always room for voluntary fundraising too often those running hospices are uncertain of the long-term future of the hospice and are having to spend vital time on chasing funds and raising money rather than in devoting themselves to their true vocation of providing first class care for their patients. 
Our policy is designed to counter this problem. 
 

Our press release is below:
In his first policy statement of the New Year and in the run-up to May’s Assembly elections, Nick Bourne committed a Welsh Conservative Assembly Government to increasing core funding to hospices and palliative care in Wales by £10 million a year with further increases in subsequent years following on from the review.
Mr Bourne also stressed his party’s commitment to providing funding for palliative care in the community, led by GPs and the voluntary sector.
 Speaking today Nick Bourne said,
“It is important that the people of Wales know exactly where we stand on this important issue in the run up to May’s Assembly elections.
Whilst we very much support the £2 million for hospices in the recent budget settlement this is merely a hesitant start and significantly less than that provided in England.
A Welsh Conservative Government in the Assembly would undertake a review into the funding of the whole sector with a view to increasing resources available to hospices and similar services by £10 million per annum with further increases in subsequent years.
We also intend that the funding should help palliative care in the community, provided by GPs and voluntary sector groups.”

 Today  I visited the  Ceredigion museum in Aberystwyth, I remember it when it was the Coliseum cinema. There were three cinemas in Aberystwyth when I was a student here ; the Coliseum along with the Celtic and the Conway and with a change of programme mid-week that could mean 6 visits to the cinema in a week. At the Coliseum the usherette on duty would insist on showing patrons to particular seats with springs coming through the upholstery at intimidating angles even if the cinema was only 10 per cent full.It is good to see the building preserved and put to good use.

 Today I wanted to see the exhibition on the lifeboat and particularly the Aber lifeboat.Looking around the exhibition one soon appreciates the extraordinary selfless acts of our lifeboat crews around Britain.With more and more leisure activities at sea lifeboats and their crews are more vital to us now than they have ever been.They are, of course independent of government and rely on voluntary contributions and legacies to survive.We owe them an enormous debt.

The Western Mail and the Daily Post both lead on the grim reality of drink and the New Year. New Year’s eve is the busiest day of the year for drink related problems.Connected with the dangers on our roads I believe that we should be looking at the case for stricter drink driving limits.

 As a nation it is hard to see why drink should appear to be so much more of a problem here than in many  countries of  mainland Europe but it is particularly disturbing that many drunks attack the very emergency services that are seeking to help them.

 As somebody who has made it a personal crusade to introduce  measures to seek to reduce the dreadful loss of life on our roads I am pleased to see that at last it seems to be on the government’s radar. The Times today discloses that there are plans for a more rigorous training programme for young drivers; there is, of course, a disproportionate loss of life among young drivers.

  Somewhat complacently the Times states that loss of life amongst women is less serious with as it states only 276 deaths and injuries last year with admittedly a much more serious tally of 869 among young men– young for these purposes being aged between 17 and 20. I do feel that training is only part of a package we should be looking at though and that restrictions on engine size and where newly qualified motorists drive should also be introduced.

 Peter Black correctly announced my New Year’s resolution on his blog as walking more– in fact specifically in the Brecon Beacons and Cambrian Mountains and along the Welsh coast. Suiting the action to the word today on New Years Day, my birthday no less I had a long walk through the Forestry enterprise land at Bwlch Nant y’r Arian.just outside Goginan on the A44 east of Aber. Dodging showers of rain and hail and in defiance of new year revelries and a very good curry at Shilam last night I set off at a cracking pace through the forest; the speed motivated partly by storm clouds gathering out at sea and partly by the fact  that the Visitor centre and importantly its restaurant were due to close at 2.30 pm.

 Very few walkers were out and not a single cyclist did we see.This could all be a feature of  late night and early morning  celebrations or more charitably misleading weather forecasting which suggested  that the weather was going to be far worse than it actually was.In any event  we arrived back at the Visitor Centre with time to spare.At 2pm in the winter and 3pm in the summer there is kite feeding at the side of the lake which is a fantastic sight and attracts families from all over the area and holidaymakers in the summer.There really is a great deal to do at Bwlch Nant y’r Arian

Late afternoon after a shower and clean up following the walk Lisa Francis calls around with birthday gifts and a bottle of champagne. Its good to see Lisa especially with the gifts!–no joking apart she is a fantastic colleague and friend.

 At leisure in Aberystwyth I realise how much  I love the town –its weather, its battered pier,its range of pubs and churches,its crowded Victorian streets, the gothic main college building, its superb views,its heaving seas,its public library barely changed in thirty years,its football team- ditto  ( joking ),starlings circling at dusk and its people friendly and cheerful– in short everything about it.